CALIFORNIA — A California jury found Meta and Google liable for a woman's addiction to Instagram and YouTube and awarded her six million dollars in damages. The case was selected as a bellwether from more than a thousand lawsuits consolidated in California before Judge Carolyn B. Kuhl.

In 2023, the plaintiff, a then-seventeen-year-old named Kaley, filed a lawsuit in California claiming that social-media addiction as a child caused her anxiety, depression, and body dysmorphia. Kuhl allowed a design claim against the social-media companies to proceed to trial, writing that "the allegedly addictive features of defendants' platforms (such as endless scroll) cannot be analogized to how a publisher chooses to make a compilation of information, but rather are based on harm allegedly caused by design features that affect how plaintiffs interact with the platforms regardless of the nature of the third-party content viewed."

Kaley's lawyers argued that the tech companies designed social-media apps to maximize user engagement with features such as infinite scroll, beauty filters, autoplay, push notifications, and custom algorithms, and that those designs constituted negligence. Under California law, a defendant can be held liable if its negligence was a substantial factor in causing the plaintiff's harm.

Kaley testified that she had been on YouTube since age six, had posted more than two hundred videos by age ten, and had created nine additional social-media accounts to like and comment on her own content. She said she had used Instagram since age eleven. "I spent all my time on it. Every time I set limits for myself, it didn't work. I just couldn't get off," she testified. Her lawyer showed the jury a collage of hundreds of selfies that Kaley had posted to Instagram.

Kaley testified that social media made her give up hobbies and prevented her from making friends. "I just can't be without it," she said. She denied that she had been abused or neglected.

Meta argued that Kaley's mental-health struggles were due to her mother's emotional and physical abuse and neglect, and that her social-media use was a coping mechanism rather than the cause of her troubles. Meta's attorneys showed Instagram posts where Kaley's mother was screaming at her.

The verdict comes as thousands of federal lawsuits have been consolidated into a proceeding in a California district court, with the first federal bellwether trial scheduled for June. A coalition of dozens of states has also sued Meta on similar claims, and a federal trial in California is expected within the next year. Separately, a New Mexico jury imposed a civil penalty of $375 million on Meta under state consumer-protection laws for misleading users about platform safety and enabling child sexual exploitation.

The American Psychological Association and the Surgeon General have recognized social-media addiction as a condition. Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act of 1996 states that an online platform is not to be treated as a publisher or speaker and cannot be held responsible for third-party content.